$4 trillion bailout?

I don't think the magnitude of this number has sunk in yet. $4 trillion is a VERY large number.

That's the rough estimate Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., gave for the cost of the "Bad Bank" proposal (a kind of warehouse for toxic assets from banks). This entity would be owned by the federal government.

Keep in mind, the total value of all the goods and services in the United States this year will be about $14 trillion. So $4 trillion is about 35 percent of the total GDP.

Total federal spending last year was about $3 trillion.

Or measuring it another way: $4 trillion is about five times as big as the stimulus. And yet the "Bad Bank" concept has not gotten the headlines the stimulus has.